Design Challenges

Friday, May 01, 2009

2 Miles: Tired but done.

Friday morning I was awaken by ADT Alarms, my colleague set off the alarm at the office. He claims a senior moment, I think otherwise, but prefer not to express it here.

I decided to leave work around 5:15 instead of my usual 6pm or later. I got home and thought about paying the dollar and heading to bed. However, I have too much of a competitive spirit to give in that easy. We pulled it together, threw on the walking shoes and out the door we went.

While discussing future plans, we thought about our new house and the palms trees that surround it. I looked up and saw some that showed some much needed trimming. It is amazing how we drive and walk around and never take in our surroundings. With that thought in mind, I started noticing how most palm trees throughout our walk need trimming. It's hard to think about trimming a palm, they are so tall, but with so many dead leaves still hanging strong all the way on top, how do you trim a palm tree anyways?

The bottom line is that even if you are too tire, look within yourself and you will find it to pull thru. While there, take a closer look at yourself and yoru surrounding, after all we are a product of our surroundings, who knows you may need a little trimming to improve yoursel.

Labels: 2-mile, biggest loser, demonstrations, exercise, Jacksonville

Thursday, February 19, 2009

IPOD GAME

My friend posted this in her facebook notes. I thought it was one of those stupid chain things, but I read on and actually sounded funny. Oddly enough, one of my songs matched hers and in the exact same question.

Here are the simple instructions, give it a try it might be fun and give you a quick laugh:
1. Put your iPod or other music player on shuffle.
2. For each question, press the next button to get your answer.
3. YOU MUST WRITE THAT SONG NAME DOWN NO MATTER HOW SILLY IT SOUNDS!
4. Tag friends who might enjoy doing this as well as the person you got this from.

IF SOMEONE SAYS "IS THIS OKAY" YOU SAY?
Red, Red, Wine - UB40

WHAT WOULD BEST DESCRIBE YOUR PERSONALITY?
California Dreaming - Mamas and Papas

WHAT DO YOU LIKE IN A GUY/GIRL?
Forever Young - Rod Stewart

WHAT IS YOUR LIFE'S PURPOSE?
The Chanukah Song - Adam Sandler

WHAT IS YOUR MOTTO?
Losing My Religion - REM

WHAT DO YOUR FRIENDS THINK OF YOU?
Pretty Vegas - JD Fortune

WHAT DO YOU THINK ABOUT VERY OFTEN?
Last Dance - Donna Summer

WHAT IS 2+2?
Rocket - Def Leppard

WHAT DO YOU THINK OF YOUR BEST FRIEND?
Won't get fool again - The Who

WHAT IS YOUR LIFE STORY?
Sara - Starship

WHAT DO YOU WANT TO BE WHEN YOU GROW UP?
Life is a battlefield - Pat Benatar

WHAT DO YOU THINK WHEN YOU SEE THE PERSON YOU LIKE?
Cleveland Rocks - Presidents of the USA

WHAT DO YOUR PARENTS THINK OF YOU?
Cruel Summer - Bananarama

WHAT WILL YOU DANCE TO (hear) AT YOUR WEDDING?
We Didn't Start the Fire - Billy Joel

WHAT WILL THEY PLAY AT YOUR FUNERAL?
We're not gonna take it - Twister Sister

WHAT IS YOUR HOBBY/INTEREST?
Bad Medicine - Bon Jovi

WHAT IS YOUR BIGGEST SECRET?
She Bangs - Ricky Martin

WHAT DO YOU THINK OF YOUR FRIENDS?
I Love You - Sarah Mclaughlin

WHAT'S THE WORST THING THAT COULD HAPPEN?
Isn't it romantic - Ella Fitzgerald

HOW WILL YOU DIE?
Dream On - Aerosmith

WHAT IS THE ONE THING YOU REGRET?
I go to extreme - Billy Joel

WHAT MAKES YOU LAUGH?
The Boys of Summer - Don Henley

WHAT MAKES YOU CRY?
Dancin with myself - Billy Idol

WILL YOU EVER GET MARRIED?
Blinded by the lights - Manfred Mann

WHAT SCARES YOU THE MOST?
Hot Stuff - Donna Summer

DOES ANYONE LIKE YOU?
Plush - Stone Temple Pilots

IF YOU COULD GO BACK IN TIME, WHAT WOULD YOU CHANGE?
Lithium - Nirvana

WHAT HURTS RIGHT NOW?
Paint it Black - ACDC

The bottom line is that sometimes we have to let ourselves go and have some fun. Silly things are the best remedy to help you during a stressful time or simply when you just need a laugh.

Labels: demonstrations, Entertainment, iPhone

Monday, February 09, 2009

The Bucket List

So my friend had this on his facebook and I felt compelled to abide. It's a take from the Jack Nicholson and Morgan Fremont movie. Don't feel like you have to do it. As Jeremy puts it, it is pretty lame. If you don't fill it out, nothing bad will happen, don't even feel the need to waste other people's time with it. But if you feel like someone will benefit somehow then copy and paste the list. Go on ... I know you can't help yourself

Quick Instructions:

Place an X by all the things you've done and remove the X from the ones you have not. I know is difficult and requires a lot of effort. If you can't figure out, then please forget about the list and consider seeking a life coach, or someone else who can ehlp you, but don't bother me with it.

Things you have done during your lifetime:
(X) Gone on a blind date
(X) Skipped school
(X) Watched someone die
(X) Been to Canada
(X) Been to Mexico
(X) Been to Florida
() Been to Hawaii
(X) Been on a plane
(X ) Been on a helicopter
(X) Been lost
(X) Gone to Washington, DC
(X) Swam in the ocean
( ) Cried yourself to sleep (I won't be doing this one, is pretty lame to feel that sorry for yourself)
(X) Played cops and robbers
(X ) Recently colored with crayons
(X) Sang Karaoke
(X) Paid for a meal with coins only
( ) Been to the top of the St. Louis Arch
(x ) Done something you told yourself you wouldn't.
(X) Made prank phone calls
( ) Been down Bourbon Street in New Orleans
(X) Laughed until some kind of beverage came out of your nose & elsewhere
(X) Caught a snowflake on your tongue
(X ) Danced in the rain
(X) Written a letter to Santa Claus
(X) Been kissed under the mistletoe
(x) Watched the sunrise with someone
(X) Blown bubbles
(x) Gone ice-skating
(X) Gone to the movies
(X) Been deep sea fishing
( ) Driven across the United States
( ) Been in a hot air balloon
( ) Been sky diving
( ) Gone snowmobiling
(X) Lived in more than one country
(X) Lay down outside at night and admired the stars while listening to the crickets
(X) Seen a falling star and made a wish
( ) Enjoyed the beauty of Old Faithful Geyser
(X) Seen the Statue of Liberty
(X) Gone to the top of Seattle Space Needle
(X) Been on a cruise
(X) Traveled by train
(X) Traveled by motorcycle
(X) Been horse back riding
( ) Ridden on a San Francisco CABLE CAR
(x) Been to Disney World
( ) Truly believe in the power of prayer
(X) Been in a rain forest
(x) Seen whales in the ocean
(X) Been to Niagara Falls
( ) Ridden on an elephant
(X) Swam with dolphins
( ) Been to the Olympics
( ) Walked on the Great Wall of China
( ) Saw and heard a glacier calf
(X) Been spinnaker flying
(X) Been water-skiing
( ) Been snow-skiing
( )Been to Westminster Abbey
( ) Been to the Louvre
( ) Swam in the Mediterranean
(X) Been to a Major League Baseball game
(X) Been to a National Football League game
(X) Jumped in the ocean when it was 20 degrees out

The bottom line is that life is short ... really short. The older I get the more I realize how short it is. You should experience as much as you can and don't let financials prevent you from doing it. Do of course plan for a secure financial future, you don't want to be homeless at 80.

Labels: advertising, demonstrations, initiative

Monday, December 22, 2008

Homes and life expectancies for major appliances

With the economy in the toilet, and Florida being one of the highest foreclosures rated states, I'm been thinking about taking my cash and reallocating it towards purchasing a home, this being a buyers market and all.

What does this really mean, it means that the people who are selling their homes are doing so because they have to, not because they want to. Meaning you are able to secure a house for a lower price than normal, sometimes even less than current market value deems the house. This also means that houses available on the market are slim pickings. Again, people are selling because they have to move.

Because we have the upper hand, we don't just want to settle for the first house we see, even though some of the houses are magnificent, they just don't satisfy 100% percent of our need. Some of the things you may want to look at when purchasing a home is the life expectancy of appliances, with so many houses needing renovations in my local area, I went ahead and look this up and found this list from Freddie Mac.

One of the things we are looking at is kitchen remodeling, it seems to me that this is why we are a nation of obese individuals, we focus so much energy into kitchens because as Americans all we do is think about food, dream about food, and live our life revolving about food. With that in mind, some sites estimate a kitchen remodeling job to run $3,000-$100,000 but average $12,000-$22,000. Better Homes and Gardens provides some sample kitchen layouts and ideas for cheap updates.

The bottom line is that nothing beats being patient. Don't rush into purchasing a home. This is a big purchase and you'll know the right home when you walk into it. If you are going to do any updates, be sure to get at least three different quotes from licensed contractor and more importantly ask for references and if you are able to visit some of their customers homes, even if you intent not to visit the home, if they say yes then you know your working with a good contractor, if they say no, RUN!!!!

Labels: demonstrations, Features, Florida, Jacksonville, techniques, visitors

Friday, November 07, 2008

Paypal Integration

I recently have been setting up an ecommerce site from the ground up. One of the task at hand was to incorporate Paypal as a method to the checkout process. Paypal offers many ways to do this. From APIs that process the credit cards on your site to passing off variables over, to simply adding a buy now button on each product.

I opted for a middle of the road option at first, which they label _cart. HEre is the code:

<br /><form target="paypal" action="https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr" method="post"> <br />    <img alt="" border="0" src="https://www.paypal.com/en_US/i/scr/pixel.gif" width="1" height="1"> <br />    <input type="hidden" name="add" value="1"> <br />    <input type="hidden" name="cmd" value="_cart"> <br />    <input type="hidden" name="upload" value="1"> <br />    <input type="hidden" name="business" value="businessowner@business.com"> <br /> <? $count = 1; while (!$db->EOF()){ ?><br />    <input type="hidden" name="item_name_<? echo $count; ?>" value="<?php echo $db->DisplayInfo("Name"); ?>;"> <br />    <input type="hidden" name="amount_<? echo $count; ?>" value="<?php echo $db->DisplayInfo("TotalPrice"); ?>;"> <br />    <input type="hidden" name="quantity_<? echo $count; ?>" value="<?php echo $db->DisplayInfo("Quantity"); ?>"> <br />    <?  $count++; $db->MoveNext();<br /> }<br /> $db->MoveFirst(); ?><br />    <input type="hidden" name="currency_code" value="USD"> <br />    <input type="hidden" name="lc" value="US"> <br />    <input type="hidden" name="bn" value="PP-ShopCartBF"><br />    <input type="image" name="Paypal_Checkout" id="Paypal_Checkout" src="https://www.paypal.com/en_US/i/btn/btn_xpressCheckout.gif" alt="Checkout with Paypal" /> <br /></form><br />

This option allows you to gather your products in your shopping cart and send each item to be listed individually on one invoice in the Paypal site. The problem is that this option does not allow the developer to submit discount or coupons.

This posed a major challenge as the site I was building makes use of coupons and other special promotions such as free shipping based on benchmarked dollars spent.

The solution, set the cmd hidden field to _xclick and pass all the items in one description field. It's not as pretty or user friendly as the previous solution, but you then only have to pass Paypal a total amount which includes all discounts, tax, shipping charges all in one line.

<br /><img src="https://a248.e.akamai.net/sec.yimg.com/i/us/smbiz/p/checkout_or_paypal.gif" vspace="10"> <br><br /><form name="_xclick" action="https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr" method="post"> <br /><input type="hidden" name="cmd" value="_xclick"> <br /><input type="hidden" name="business" value="businessowner@business.com"> <br /><input type="hidden" name="currency_code" value="USD"> <br /><input type="hidden" name="item_name" value="<?php echo $db->TotalColumn("FullDetails") ?>  "> <br /><input type="hidden" name="amount" value="<?php echo $db->GrandTotal() ?>"> <br />  <input type="hidden" name="image_url" value="http://www.dbboutique.com/images/Logo_Small.jpg"> <br />  <input type="hidden" name="no_note" value="0"> <br />  <input type="hidden" name="cancel_return" value="http://www.site.com/failure/">  <br />  <input type="hidden" name="return" value="http://www.site.com/success"> <br />  <input type="image" name="Paypal_Checkout" id="Paypal_Checkout" src="https://www.paypal.com/en_US/i/btn/btn_xpressCheckout.gif" alt="Checkout with Paypal" /> <br /></form><br />

The bottom line is that as you are developing Web sites you will be thrown several curves. You will encounter a multitude of problems. The best thing to do is to go at it, do some research and thing of simple solutions. Don't get wrap up on the problem, the best solutions are simple, effective, and best of all easy to code.

Labels: cms, CSS, demonstrations, Design, Paypal, Web Design, Web Development

Tuesday, July 29, 2008

Are you in a pyramid scheme?

Next time you find yourself sitting in a business meeting, instead of zoning out, pay attention to how things go down. Someone comes up with a new idea, the executive thinks the idea is brilliant. Together they identify who is going to perform the task, the executive will leave the meeting and head over to the CEOs office and present the idea. He will take full credit for the idea or he will say it was a collaboration from the originator and himself. Some lowly man down the totem pole will put in over time, they might even put in a weekend or two to accommodate this brilliant idea into their already full plate of tasks. Once compile and completed the sales person will bring in new money to the company where the CEO will congratulate the executive on a brilliant thought and a great job well done, while the lowly individual will get to put in many more extra hours and keep delivering product for another 20 years and perhaps one day get noticed and promoted to head janitor.

Wikipedia describes a pyramid scheme as a non-sustainable business model that involves the exchange of money primarily for enrolling other people into the scheme, usually without any product or service being delivered. It has been known to come under many guises. In other words, the lowest man in the bottom does all the work while the ones above gets all the glory.

The bottom line is that you want to get yourself out of the bottom of the pyramid and march up the diagonal. In order to do so, you need to identify what makes you unique and sets you apart. What do you bring to the table? You must enjoy doing something that others don't. You enjoy doing because you are good at it. Take your talent and find the right place where you will now be able to sell it as the commodity. You, my friend, will not longer be at the bottom putting in the extra time and effort into tasks that other dreamt up for you; you will now be delegating to others and only performing the tasks which you enjoy.

Labels: demonstrations, Features

Sunday, February 17, 2008

"Winning" Super Bowl shirts end up in Nicaragua

The superbowl this year was a little different for me. Besides being the most boring one I ever watched, I was accompanied by a few friends and colleagues. I never had a superbowl party before, but the turnout was good and everyone claimed to had fun.

Why I am writing about this today, when it happened such a while ago, mainly because I just read story about shirts ending up in Nicaragua. Shirts that were premade with thoughts that the Patriots were designed to be te dream team, with an undefeated season, they were expected to be superbowl champs. Instead, the Giants came out of nowhere with Manning making an exciting fourth quarter manuvering and claiming victory!

Back to the story, "shirts and caps proclaiming the victory of the New England Patriots -- when the American football team actually lost the latest Super Bowl -- have ended up in the hands of poor Nicaraguan children." This is a great act of charity and donation for an empoverish country, but what of the erronous information on them? Should the shirts really be given out even though many are to benefit?

What a dilemma? Erronous information being circulated around a third world country or a nice act of kindness.

The bottom line is that we must put our own selfishness aside for the greater good. I think Voltaire and Locke had it right. These men influence the US founding fathers into creating liberty for all and for all to be free to do what is best for the common good! Locke always aregued that property is a natural right and it is derived from labor, but what labor is there involve in charitable things, but the labor of good. However, in his essay, the social contract, he postulates that an exchange of goods wold not take place if the parties involved whee not satisfied, in the aforementined sory and exchanged took place, therefore it must had been good. Children obtain useless shirts which would not have derived a profit while the manufacturer obtained a charitable tax write off and the gratitude of many.

Labels: advertising, Customer Service, demonstrations, Freedom of Speech, health

Wednesday, August 08, 2007

St. Augustine is old but has lots of style

The communities in St. Augustine are designed in such a way that you feel like you are in the middle of no where, yet you drive out of the community entrance and there are shops, bars, and plenty of nightlife.

This past weekend I finally got to go out and get to see what's around nearby the new digs. This new chapter is very interesting. There is a lot going on and yet feels like there is not much. Within ten minutes I can find an outlet store center with over 200 shops, mostly top name designers.

Five minutes past the outlets, I can find downtown St. Augustine. There is a lot of history there. I didn't arrive downtown until after 4p.m. on Sunday. Everything closes there early, but what I saw I enjoyed. St. Augustine is the first city in the United States. There was a demonstration happening near the Castillo of San Marcos, a Spanish fort designed and built in the 1600's in an effort to guard the city. The old fort help the Spaniards keep a hold of Florida from the Brits for many years. During the American Revolution, this fort was a British stronghold, and later it served as a battery for the US Coastal defense system.

This fort is now one of the major tourist attractions in St. Augustine. They happened to be having a very nice demonstration of how the Spaniards dressed and weapons used while I was visiting. They fired off riffles and a canon. The later was quite loud and although we were forewarned to cover our ears, one could still feel the body rattle and shake, enough to skip a beat. All and all a very interesting visit. I will need to come back and see more, a lot more.

The bottom line is that when you find yourself in a new location, it is very important to drive around and get to know the area. Not only do you get to see a lot of interesting stuff, but when it visitor season opens, otherwise known as "the relatives are visiting", there are plenty of ways and places to keep them out of the house.

Labels: demonstrations, Design, visitors